Mega Million Slot Machine
Microgaming have once again raised the bar in online slot entertainment with the release of their first new progressive slot machine in almost a year. It was well worth the wait as Mega Moolah is the first online progressive to come with a base level jackpot of $1,000,000 - now whenever you log on to a Microgaming powered online casino you have a chance of winning a million.
Mega Moolah actually has quite a few great features apart from the million dollar jackpot. You could say that Microgaming have taken the best parts from a range of their slot machines and combined them into one great package. Let's start with the basics and go from there.
The game is a 5 reel, 25 line video slot. It comes in three different coin sizes (1¢, 2¢ and 5¢) and has a max bet of 5 coins per pay line. This means you are looking at spending 125 coins per spin. Unlike most progressives the same jackpot is available no matter which coin size you choose although there is a distinct advantage to playing the highest nickel level - more on that later.
- A dollar slot machine called “The Million Dollar Baby,” but he was not paid the $1,061,812 jackpot for it. Erickson took the matter to court, and in 1989 a District Court judge ruled against him.
- One of the world-record slot machine jackpots to occur in Las Vegas happened at the MGM Resorts-owned Excalibur Hotel & Casino in 2003, according to records from International Game Technology.
- Mega Fortune Slots Designed to thrill online gamers, Mega Fortune delivers on the promise held in its name as every aspect of it reflects something about living the high life. With 5 reels, 4 bet levels and a generous 25 bet lines, you can manipulate each spin to suit your current desires.
Mega Moolah has an African safari theme. Symbols include animals such as lions, giraffes, zebras and elephants as well as the common high card symbols such as jacks, queens and tens. The lion is wild for all other symbols and also doubles any win it is a part of.
Highest win on the reels is 15,000 times your line bet or 75,000 coins at max bet. This is won by lining up five of the wilds. Second highest pay is 12,500 coins for five scatters. The scatter symbols also activate the free spin bonus. Hit three or more and you win 15 free games with all wins tripled. This boosts the highest jackpot up to a very handy 225,000 coins.
Now to the progressive. You will notice above the reels there are four progressive meters. These read Mini, Minor, Major and Mega - yes, Mega Moolah has not one but four progressive jackpots. So how do you win them? At the end of every spin the jackpot bonus can be awarded randomly.
Megabucks by IGT Megabucks is a Dollar coin Slot Machine that must have 3 coins ($3.00) played to hit the jackpot. The jackpot is reset to $10,000,000.00 after a jackpot is hit. Current Megajackpot Totals Last Hit History of Jackpots Where to Play. Good Morning, Those of you have followed my posts know of my ' Casino Kids ' and how much they mean to me and my family. Mark and Ali who were married this past October are expecting their first child this coming August and we did a Zoom call with everyone involved to celebrate.
You do not need to line up any specific symbols but the twist is that the jackpot will come up more often the higher you bet. So if you play at the highest coin size of a nickel you will have a better chance of activating the bonus stage than if you played the penny coin size. Having said that there is no reason why you could not win the jackpot playing pennies - it is just less likely.
Once you have activated the jackpot bonus you are taken to the Wheel of Fortune style jackpot stage (View The Bonus). Here you simply press spin and watch the wheel spin. The segments all have one of the four possible jackpots on them. When the wheel comes to a stop you are warded the corresponding jackpot and returned to the reels.
Of course the jackpots are not all of the same value. The mini starts at just $10, and the minor at $100. The Major starts at a nice $10,000 and the mega starts rolling at a big $1,000,000. The lower jackpots hit very frequently while the Mega has been won as high as $4,300,000!
Overall, Microgaming has done a great job taking the best parts of their most popular games and combining them into what is sure to become one of the most popular slot machines on the Internet.
- Appendices
- Slots Analysis
- Miscellaneous
Introduction
This page investigates the odds of the progressive jackpot slot machine, Megabucks, including the average jackpot and breakeven point.
For now, let's ignore the fact that a jackpot is paid by installments over 25 years and that the jackpot would be subject to income tax.
I don't know exactly how Megabucks is programmed. However, there is some information that is public knowledge. If we fit the pieces together, we can make a pretty good estimate of the point at which the return is 100%, known as the 'breakeven point.' Here is what we do know:
- According to John Robison, the probability of hitting the jackpot is 1 in 49,836,032. This figure comes from an article titled Megabucks closes in on record jackpot from the Las Vegas Sun, Dec. 24, 1999. That probability comes to (1/368)3, implying each reel has a 1 in 368 chance of stopping on the jackpot symbol.
- The Nevada Gaming Control Board indicates that the profit of Megabucks on both a percentage and dollar basis. The following is a summary for 1994 to 2009.
Megabucks Win — 1994 to 2009
Year Win ($) Win (%) 2009 53,352,000 10.43% 2008 83,981,000 11.85% 2007 88,858,000 12.72% 2006 100,923,000 12.39% 2005 100,923,000 12.39% 2004 67,326,000 10.54% 2003 83,069,000 10.41% 2002 76,842,000 11.98% 2001 69,821,000 11.50% 2000 69,103,000 9.75% 1999 74,921,000 12.28% 1998 134,943,000 12.25% 1997 66,166,000 12.18% 1996 57,619,000 10.03% 1995 65,223,000 10.48% 1994 46,760,000 9.44% total 1,239,830,000 11.39% The key piece of information from this table is that the overall profit of the game has been 11.39%. In other words, 88.61% is returned to the players.
- According to defunct source, starting in September 2005, Megabucks was reset to a jackpot of $10 million. Before that, the reset value was $7 million.
- According to a2zlasvegas.com, there have been 11 jackpots hit between September 2005 and the date of the last jackpot (Feb. 21, 2010). That same website shows a jackpot was hit on September 15, 2005. The number of days between then and the time of this writing is 1,619 days. We also see from that website that the total of the last 11 jackpots was $167,367,727. Of that, $110,000,000 was from the reset amounts and $57,367,727 was from the progressive contribution.
The portion of money returned to players in form of jackpots is thus $167,367,727/$1,644,589,056 = 10.18%. From the Nevada Gaming reports, we know a total of 88.61% is returned to players. That means that the portion returned to players in non-jackpots is 88.61% - 10.18% = 78.44% (The 0.01% apparent difference is due to rounding).
If there were no small wins, and no progressive contribution, then the return of the game would be $10 million/(3×(1/368)3) = 6.69%. As already shown, the total return from jackpots is 10.18%, leaving 3.49% coming from the jackpot meter. Here is a summary of where each $1 bet on Megabucks goes:
Megabucks Breakdown
| Item | Cents |
|---|---|
| Fixed wins | 78.44¢ |
| Meter reset | 6.69¢ |
| Progressive contribution | 3.49¢ |
| Profit | 11.39¢ |
| Total | 100.00¢ |
The average point at which the jackpot will hit is 10 million + [$3 × 0.0349 / (1/368)3] = $15,215,248. In 2006, when the jackpot was almost $16 million, IGT, Megabuck's creator, purchased ads in the local media stating that the jackpot was 'overdue' to hit. I'm quoted in a Las Vegas Sun article about it, titled 'Pennies ready to pop'. This would seem to indicate my $15.2 million figure is not far off.
If j is the jackpot at which the game becomes a fair bet, with a 100% return, then we can solve for j as follows:
1 = 0.7844 + j × (1/368)3/3
j × (1/368)3/3 = 1 - 0.7844
j = 3 × (1 - 0.7844) / (1/368)3
j = $32,238,319.
The probability of any given jackpot growing this big is 1.41%. At the current rate of play, a jackpot should get this big once every 29 years, on average.
At any given time the return can be estimated as 78.44% + 0.6689%×m, where m is the number in millions of the current jackpot. For example, at a jackpot of $15 million, the return would be 78.44% + 0.006689×15 = 88.47%.
Everything in this page should be taken as a ballpark estimate. Various factors could cause it to be off, including players not betting the full $3 and the fact that while 11 jackpots were hit in the study period, the expected number could be higher or lower.
It also bears repeating that the above does not factor in the annuity or taxes. Let's look at what happens if we do consider those factors. For the time value of money, let's use the return on long-term Treasury Bills. Megabucks jackpots are paid in a 25-year annuity. At the time of this writing a 20-year T-Bill paid 4.58% interest, and a 30-year one paid 4.74%. Let's split the difference at 4.66%. Using some actuarial math I won't get into, the value of the annuity is worth 61.07% of face value, based on that interest rate, and 25 annual installments, at the beginning of each year.
For taxes, let's assume close to the expected jackpot of $15 million. Under 2010 income tax rates, assuming the winner is filing jointly, and all other income exactly equals deductions, the taxes due will be 30.05% for 2010. Assuming no change in the tax law, that will drop over time, because the tax brackets will be adjusted upward, but the winning payments won't be. I tend to think the recent passage of health care will increase tax rates, especially on large incomes. Let's just assume those factors cancel each other out, to keep it simple.
So to keep things in round numbers, the winner will keep 61% after the annuity, and 70% of that after taxes. So the jackpot winner will see about 61% × 70% = 42.7% of his winnings in current dollars. Factoring the annuity and taxes, the breakeven point becomes $75.5 million. The probability of any given jackpot growing that big is about 1 in 283,000, and will happen once every 114,000 years. Again, I'm making lots of assumptions, so these estimates should be considered very rough.
After publishing this article, a reader quoted a page at slot-machine-resource.com, which states that after the first installment is made, the player is given the option to get 60% of the rest immediately, or stick with the installment plan. Tax implications aside, which favor the annuity, the interest rate at which the two options are equal is 4.581%.
External Links
Mega Slot Machine Bonus Wins
- Megabucks Closes in on Record Jackpot from the Las Vegas Sun, Dec. 24, 1999.
- Nevada Gaming Control Board
- Slots Payout percentage, from Cassaon Casino.
- History of Megabucks Jackpots, from a2zlasvegas.com.
- Pennies Ready to Pop, from the Aug. 9, 2006 Las Vegas Sun.
- Megabucks, from slot-machine-resource.com.